He says to the American people, “you made one of your greatest mistakes, in that you neither brought to account nor punished those who waged this war, not even the most violent of its murderers, [former Defense Secretary Donald] Rumsfeld…”

“You permitted Bush to complete his first term, and stranger still, chose him for a second term, which gave him a clear mandate from you — with your full knowledge and consent — to continue to murder our people in Iraq and Afghanistan. Then you claim to be innocent! The innocence of yours is like my innocence of the blood of your sons on the 11th — were I to claim such a thing.”

This guy’s got to have a media adviser. The first thing you do is mention George W. Bush, whose approval ratings are in the toilet.

And, since Americans hate all their politicians right now, the Democrats:

[Y]ou elected the Democratic Party for this purpose, but the Democrats haven’t made a move worth mentioning. On the contrary, they continue to agree to the spending of tens of billions to continue the killing and war there.”

And, to show you care, the economic plight of Americans:

He also speaks to recent issues grabbing headlines in the United States, referring to “the reeling of many of you under the burden of interest-related debts, insane taxes and real estate mortgages; global warming and its woes…”

Hmm, sounds just like the platitudes you hear in the standard political stump speech.

But this quote has to qualify as the single funniest thing I’ve heard all day:

“To conclude,” bin Laden says, “I invite you to embrace Islam.” He goes on to say: “There are no taxes in Islam, but rather there is a limited Zakaat [alms] totaling 2.5 percent.”

Like this:

It’s a sad world when a terrorist/mass murderer’s policy platform makes more sense than the Republican Party’s.

http://vitalsocialissuesnstuff.com/ Mikester

Personally I think they’re trying to make Osama and Islam sound like the people who oppose Rudy, Hillary and the rest…. By producing another fake video…. Trying to associate the ideas of liberty with a perceived boogeyman (who is really a plant). I think they are afraid to commit another 9/11 so this is the next best thing they can try to do.

http://fpffressminds.blogspot.com/ Stephen Littau

Oh jeez, another truther.

UCrawford

Mikester,

You’re full of shit with that “our government perpetrated 9/11″ garbage. Go take that bullshit over to this page ( http://www.debunking911.com/ ). The guy who runs it (an anti-Bush liberal) loves destroying truther arguments with real science before telling them to go fuck themselves. Great guy.

That said, from the very few pictures I’ve seen of bin Laden (supposedly from the recent video) I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that it wasn’t actually bin Laden but someone who looked like him (kind of like Saddam used to do with body doubles). Bin Laden was looking exceedingly rough in his last confirmed tape, there’s a large store of anecdotal intelligence indicating he was suffering from severe kidney disease and required dialysis, he’s in a region where advanced medical care is difficult to come by, and al-Qaeda has a vested interest in perpetrating the image of him running their “resistance”. So it wouldn’t surprise me if bin Laden was dead and this guy was an imposter.

http://hathor-sekhmet.blogspot.com VRB

It would seem if he had severe kidney disease, the Americans could find him. Dialysis supplies don’t grow on trees. There is not a lot of paraphernalia you can recycle.

Aren’t most of the top Al Qeada members well educated?

UCrawford

The question’s always been if he actually has kidney disease and how severe it is…a lot of it was conjecture based on anecdotal evidence and his continually deteriorating appearance. Apparently the government confirmed it was bin Laden’s voice on the tape so he may still be alive and free of severe medical problems after all.

The al-Qaeda leadership are actually pretty well-educated. I believe al-Zawahiri’s a medical doctor and bin Laden is an engineer (I actually stayed in the house he built for Mullah Omar for a little while when I was doing my tour in Afghanistan).